Arallu – Six (Review)

Arallu are black metal band from Israel and this is their sixth album.

Arallu are one of those rare, special bands that developed their own personality and style of attack very early on, and with every subsequent album they simply refine this more and more.

The band’s previous album Geniewar was the height of their work up to that point, but now we have the extremely impressive Six, and the bar has been raised once again. Six albums in, and it’s extremely impressive how the band keep getting better and better.

This is a streamlined, focused Arallu; Geniewar had over an hour of material, whereas Six is a lot leaner, clocking in at 38 minutes. This demonstrates that Arallu really have included only the best of what they have written. Across these ten tracks, the band show well and truly what they are capable of, and it’s genuinely great to hear.

The songs sound fuller and more well-rounded than ever. This is due to a combination of quality songwriting and probably the most comprehensive and professional production they have had so far. Six sounds huge, in all of the right ways.

The band play their black metal with Middle Eastern influences and melodies, which help give them their own charismatic charms, and this is mixed with elements of thrash and death metal for extra bite. This rather simplistic description doesn’t quite prepare you for how textured and rich the songs are though, with even the shorter tracks on this album having a wide range of different ideas and exotic musical influences included in them. These are weaved into the band’s brand of extreme metal naturally and in an unforced manner, highlighting how this inclusion comes as easily as breathing to Arallu.

Whenever Arallu release a new album I always say that it’s their best work yet, and this just goes to show how good of a band they are. Six is their best work yet, (at least until whatever they do next). If there was any justice in the world Arallu would be destined for high-profile greatness. Until then, don’t miss out – get Six, and get immersed in Arallu’s world.